


Time Will Crawl

by evarosen, pillstaker



Category: Terminator Genisys (2015)
Genre: He Really Should Have Thought This Through, John is a creep, M/M, Platonic Cuddling, Though It's Not Really His Intention To Be, at first, at least that was the idea
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-19
Updated: 2015-09-14
Packaged: 2018-04-15 15:29:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,299
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4611939
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/evarosen/pseuds/evarosen, https://archiveofourown.org/users/pillstaker/pseuds/pillstaker
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John decided to keep Kyle by his side. It's not like they have anyone else, even if Kyle doesn't know what they are to each other. And sometimes he couldn't help looking at him, searching for signs of himself on the younger man. But John had always favored his mother; he should have remembered that.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

John had grown up with stories about Kyle Reese almost as much as he did with lessons about survival.

How he'd been brave and resourceful, how he had, against all odds, ensured Sarah Connor's survival and in turn John's, willingly giving up the future and freedom he'd fought so desperately for.

About how much he'd loved John's mother, despite their brief time together.

All of this is swimming inside John's head as he stares at the child he brough to camp, the one who won't let go of his hand, the one who'd said "Everyone I know is dead", and "I want to stay with you" and "My name is Kyle Reese".

He really should let him under someone else's care. He knows he's almost sure to survive no matter what, fate will take care of it. He knows he can't compromise himself this way.

He looks into Kyle's solemn, kind eyes, and can't help the pull of having something for himself, to keep the part of his family he can have in this devastated world.

So he says nothing, no oficially; but he doesn't stop Kyle from following him around, and starts training him to fight.

Kyle presses himself to his side when they sit together, and John gives him the ocassional pat in the head or half hug when he does well in training or combat. 

He's a child. They're family.

It doesn't occur to John nobody else knows that.

*

It takes Kyle a long time to hit any growth spur to speak of. By age fifteen he's small for his age, and he's aware of that, sulkily folding up the hem of his fatigues (they're John's spare, and they need a lot of folding).

"Don't you worry, you'll grow as tall as me," John says confidently, while Kyle glares murder at some other soldier who'd accidentally tripped him and didn't have anything more tactful to say than "Didn't see you, kid."

Kyle gives him a doubtful look, seemingly caught between being hopeful at the notion and annoyed at having his worries being so apparent.

"Is that one of your prophecies, John?"

John is about to laugh, but Kyle's look is intent and serious, so he pursues his lips and gives the matter a second's thought. His mother had mentioned Kyle had been (would be) tall, and certainly John had not taken after her in that department.

"Yes, it is." He says, and does smile. Kyle, bless his unwavering faith, doesn't seem to worry about the matter anymore.

As it turns out, John falls short (or Kyle does) by an inch or so.

Still, the difference is minimal, and it only means Kyle is able to rest his head effortlessly on John's shoulder when they slump against each other out of tiredness or cold.

John can't say he minds. 

*

John is very much aware of the holes between his knowledge of the future (present, much of it past at this point) and what it'll really take to be a believable unfailing leader based on it alone.

So he uses it as sparingly as he can, relying on his skills as a fighter and strategist for the most part.

Worse of all are the details that can't be helped, that he must allow to take place least he compromises what must happen.

He sometimes hears a name, looks at someone and can't help, by some reference or margin note, to know their days are numbered, even if he doesn't quite know the how.

But it works the other way around sometimes. He's reasonably sure Kyle will survive to see the end of the war.

He has to. He already has.

He repeats that to himself in a loop, frantically, as Kyle throws himself over him to protect him from the explosion, as Kyle's blood soaks through both their uniforms and he goes limp over John.

*

"Your boy will be alright", the medic tells him, and John takes a moment to make sure nobody sees his hands trembling.

"He..." John starts, not willing to concede at Kyle being more valuable to him than any other of his soldiers, but if he really wanted that, he should have objected at him taking priority on recieving treatment, shouldn't he? So he clears his throat, and thanks the medic, and goes to see for himself.

The cot is narrow, but Kyle is laying on his side, so he carefully climbs behind him and lays a hand on the uninjured part of his shoulder.

He thinks Kyle is asleep.

He rests his cheek over the boy's hair (longer than he usually likes to wear it, but they've been moving too often for any of them to find the time for personal grooming), and takes a deep, unhappy breath.

"And here I was thinking you were smarter than that." he murmurs, and realizes his mistake when Kyle tenses under his hand.

"How many casualties?" Kyle asks, tilting his head to look at him. His face is tense and pinched, either from the pain or John's _faux pas_.

John is silent for a second, but eventually he has to answer. 

"I'm not sure yet." He meets Kyle's gaze evenly, knows Kyle has probably been awake for a while (he has a high pain threshold, which is why John has taken the habit of dismissing his protests of wellbeing after any battle in which they are parted for more than a few seconds), and thus takes the answer for what really means ("I was so worried about you I barely moved from here".)

"You should count our losses," Kyle murmurs, curling on himself. John looks around, but nobody is paying attention to them; the last battle didn't actually left many injured. Most of them either came back on their feet or simply didn't. The makeshift infirmary is mostly desert.

"You should stop acting as if you didn't matter." John says, and he knows it's irrational even before the words leave his mouth. He would have done the same for Kyle or anyone else had he seen the shot coming before they did. He doesn't question if the fact he also knows _he_ will survive to see the end of the war weights on it or not. Not often, at least.

He allows himself to press his mouth over Kyle's head, a barely-there gesture that both of them can pretend never happened, and gets up to leave.

"You matter more." Kyle says, not loudly but not a whisper, exactly; and John supposes they will pretend that didn't happen, either.


	2. Chapter 2

John doesn't realize their time is running thin until the first 'skin job' makes its appearance.

It's not that he's unaware of time passing, or forgets to keep track of the date, or anything like that. It's just that fighting and death seems to strech endlessly both before and after him, marked only by milestones of greater disasters, and sometimes it catches with him with a start, how the days had bled together and another year has gone by.

But. The skin job.

The first one decimates half a base before it can be stopped.

It's Kyle's perpetually crappy luck that makes him be there to deliver intelligence to the camp leader, and the universe's way to righten itself, perhaps, what allows him to fire the shot that takes out the new model's power source.

John is reluctant to see the remains, for more than one reason. 

Kyle comes limping to stand next to the table, and John slips an arm around his waist to stabilize him, without taking his eyes from the sheet-covered form.

"A secondary power source?" He asks, though it would have kicked on by now had it counted with one.

Kyle says as much, leaning against John to take the weight off his injured ankle.

"He...it came at night, wearing a hoodie." Kyle says bitterly. "Asked for shelter. Gave us a name. Don't even remember what."

John uncovers the face quickly. Like peeling a band-aid, they used to say, when there were things like band-aids and small cuts were worth worrying for.

The man-shaped thing in the table has cherry-blond hair, and the face is narrow and angular. The skin is rubbery, and that must have been the reason it came at night. Easy to spot, if you took a good look at it.

John exhales minutely.

"I think it was Bob? He looks like a Bob." Kyle adds. and John flinches; a small thing, but Kyle is right against his face, and he notices even if nobody else does.

"Don't...don't call it that." John says before he can restrain himself. Kyle meets his eyes, and John lowers his. "I knew...someone...named Bob once. He was a good guy." John mutters. He can feel Kyle's searching look; John never volunteers stuff unrelated to the war, and he must be aching to ask.

"Or maybe it was Tom. Did you know a Tom? What am I asking, everybody knows a Tom." Kyle says in a light tone (or as light as anyone manages these days). John gives him a grateful look.

"I knew a Tom. He was a jerk." He jokes, and Kyle laughs.

"Ok. So what do we do with our not-friend Tom here?"

"Prepare for more of them." John says, and the mood turns somber again. He covers the doll-like features again and slides his grip to Kyle's ribcage to steer him away.

A little more time, but not much.

*

Both Kyle and John have shared any number of sleeping arrangements with any number of people. Sharing a bed (or a cot, or a blanket on the floor) is not big deal when you're in the middle of a war.

John does have nicer arrangements when the occasion permits, true; and so Kyle had slept with him the first year or so upon arrival. This had less to do with Kyle being under John's care than it had with Kyle's nightmares getting worse in a crowded room.

That had lasted until John had arrived one day from patrol to find Kyle's gear gone from his quarters.

The night before Kyle had woken up screaming, calling for his dad; and John unthinkingly, foolishly, had gropped for his hand in the darkness, tangled his fingers on his hair and murmured "Shhh, I'm here," before he was fully awake.

But Kyle didn't melt against him, as he had done almost every time when John had tried to comfort him before; insted he had pulled away as if burned, jumping off the bed before John could even realize what had happened.

"I'm..I'm sorry." John had said, not really sure of what he was apologizing for. Then he had remember what he'd said, and felt the blood draining from his face. "God, I'm sorry, I didn't think..."

"That's ok." Kyle had answered, not looking at him; but he had not gone back to sleep. He'd sat on the chair at John's small desk, looking at him with an unreadable expression, not saying anything more; and eventually John had closed his eyes, not wanting to make the situation worse.

So he didn't protest when Kyle said it would be best if he shared space with the other soldiers instead of waking up John on a nightly basis; besides, it wasn't fair, since John himself didn't have nightmares.

That is not true, of course. John wakes up with a jolt two or three times a night; but he doesn't scream. He's trained himself not to make noise, not to call attention. Not to show weakness.

So it is pure convenience, he tells himself, for Kyle to return to his room, with his latest promotion. Kyle is his right hand man; they make plans together, and so it will be practical if they can talk in private without having to make a fuss over it.

Kyle agrees easily enough; they move his cot next to John's and they share the desk this time. 

Sometimes John hears Kyle whimper on his sleep and reaches to shake him awake; sometimes Kyle extends his hand wordlessly and John gripes it until they both fall asleep.

John never has comforting touches or even casual ones to offer his other soldiers; Kyle never seeks anyone else's company.

And time goes by.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, would you read something more explicit? Evil!manipulative!John? Crack fic? What do you think? There's one one or two more chapters to go with this one.


	3. Chapter 3

As the end approaches, the battles are more brutal. Skynet gets desperate; infiltrators are harder to recognize, and one manages to blow himself along with one of the resistance's larger quarters.

John's had most of their artillery moved already, but it turns out the diary he had consulted had gotten the date off by almost two days, so the place is still half full of people when it goes up in flames.

"Cannot...self terminate _my ass_ ," John coughs, scanning the rubble for people still trapped.

He's still fuming over the innacuracy and debating if he should fix the data or it's somehow his fault for not remembering correctly the first time around, or if he somehow chose to let it like it is, and giving himself a headache to rival the sting of the burns he sustained, when Kyle sits next to him with a muffled groan.

"You should be in the infirmary," John says under his breath. Kyle's a Sargeant now, so he cannot go around chiding him like the stubborn kid he sometimes resembles.

"Look who's talking," Kyle answers without missing a beat, his voice strained. He's leaning forward, elbows on his knees, and there's a good reason for it: there's bits of charred uniform sticking to his back, toward the center.

It's not extense (most likely caused for flying bits of flaming debris instead of his clothes catching fire), but despite his stoicism, it must hurt like hell.

John considers his own bandaged forearm, and the fact that everyone else has already settled as comfortably as the conditions will allow. 

They need to lay low, he's told his next in command. That the next offensive will cost them dearly, he's told nobody. Not even Kyle.

"True. But I wouldn't turn down a few hours' rest, and a little of help getting to my bunk." John's leg got stabbed by a piece of debris; and while it wasn't on fire, at least, he won't be putting his whole weight on it for a while.

"Alright," Kyle says agreeably, helping John up. John waits until they're moving to add:

"After we have the medic look at your back."

To his credit, Kyle has a lot less of a temper than John had at his age, when Sarah used to pull almost the exact same trick on him.

*

Supplies are low, so they have to make do with a bit of milk for the burns. 

John has some salve left over, however, and since nobody will take it from him he uses it on Kyle's back when he asks for help with the places he can't reach.

"John, no..." Kyle starts when he realises. Probably from the smell, since there's no skin left on the bit in which John's aplying the stuff.

"It'll pull when you move your arm, if it doesn't heal properly." John says in a quiet, 'I'm only being practical and not coddling you' tone. "Be a problem, with the larger weapons."

That shuts Kyle up like a charm, even if his jaw is still set. John can see his mulish expression clearly over his shoulder.

"At least it didn't reach you in the face. _Not in the face_ , that's our family motto." John tries to joke. If they actually had one, it'll probably be 'the future is not written', but he figures he can go for a few minutes without telling Kyle things he knows to be patently untrue. "Only sticking to it skipped a generation, as you're well aware. I'm glad to see you'll likely do better"

"I'm not your son," Kyle says in a flat voice, muscles tensing under John's fingertips.

John lets his hand drop, taken by surprise. "I know, sorry, I just..."

But Kyle is already reaching for his shirt, hastily leaving the room. 

John lets him go, mentally cursing himself, and lays on his bed, headache back on full force.

*

He drifts off eventually, for a while. In the middle of the night, he hears the door open, and Kyle gets in and sits at the feet of his bed.

"Are you sleeping?" he whispers, and John shakes his head.

" _You_ should sleep," John says. There's a bit of moonlight coming through the window, and Kyle looks like death warmed over, paler than usual.

"I can't. Hurts too much," Kyle mutters. John takes the unusual admission as a peace offering, and reaches for his hand, tugging slightly.

"Come here," he says, and Kyle goes unresisting, draping himself over John and resting his head on his shoulder. John runs a hand soothingly down his arm.

"Would you have minded much? Scars on my face, I mean." Kyle says, as if getting injured only mattered in the measure it would inconvenience John.

"Well, two people scaring children in the same camp is no good for morale," John says. He'll have a talk with Kyle about self-preservation in the morning, but now he's warm and relaxing, and doesn't want him to bolt again. 

He thinks he can actually sleep, really sleep instead of passing out out of tiredness, with Kyle's familiar weight over him. Even his burns hurt less, like this.

"The children love you," Kyle argues, ever loyal. His breath tickles the skin on John's throat. John runs his fingers in the nape of his neck, fondly.

"Believe me, Kyle, you are not the typical child," John says, because he can't leave well alone; but Kyle doesn't take immediate offense. 

He breathes for a few seconds, quiet and measured, and John wraps his arms around him as best as he can, mindful of his back, thinking he's finally down for the count; but then Kyle turns his head, pressing his lips on the corner of John's mouth.

"I haven't been a child for a long time, John. How I wish you stopped treating me like one," he says, before settling his head down again, burying his face on John's neck.

John doesn't react at first, too stunned to even jerk away; and then the moment is gone, and he's not really sure...

It's dark, and Kyle was barely conscious, and...

And John can't force himself to let go of him. He decides he's so tired he's imagining things.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What? Denial's John friend, like, in general.


	4. Chapter 4

Kyle is a grown man now, John is forced to admit to himself, even if he won't dignify his sudden realisation with words.

Kyle has been for a while now.

John just hadn't wanted to admit it.

John stares at him out of the corner of his eye, sometimes, as he charges weapons or gestures as he talks, imparting orders. 

He does it with John's exact same mannerisms, and John wonders, how much is because of what they are, and how much of it Kyle has deliberately learned, copied from him.

_He taught me everything I know._

Kyle had told Sarah he had let go of him. He'd saved Kyle, perhaps not knowing who he was, and let him to fend for himself. They'd met again, and they had been brothers in arms, but maybe that John never knew.

He looks at Kyle, and thinks what would they think of each other, if they were to meet now, two random fighters amidst the chaos.

He can't imagine not...

But perhaps that makes him worse, knowing and being willing to go through with it still.

He thinks of Kyle learning the truth, knowing John would send him to die. 

He can't imagine he would refuse, and that makes it even worse.

Kyle is a grown man, and he can make his own decisions, and not two years from now he will decide to make a desperate attempt to preserve John's existance and ensure their victory.

He will offer to, freely.

John spends more nights than not wide awake, listening to Kyle breathe on his bed. 

Free will. What a laugh.

*

When it happens, is at random.

They've been injured, true. John had been bleeding a lot, that much he concedes; still, there's nothing much different from a dozen other times when they're tangled together in a single cot, closeness reminding them they've lived to fight another day, nothing to have caused the big difference of Kyle's lips trailing against John's neck, his hand timidly trailing under his shirt to feel the warmth of the skin on John's side.

John is half-asleep, for once, dead tired; so at first he barely even registers what is happening. Kyle's mouth moves to his, and he kisses back, reflexively; Kyle's closeness could never feel like a threat to him.

Then his brain processes the meaning of this new intimacy; and he clutches at Kyle's arms, in a panic. 

He clumsily tries to disentangle himself; no easy feat in the narrow cot, least when he's trying to do it without tumbling them to the floor; almost impossible with how his limbs plain _refuse_ to cooperate in putting any distance between them.

"I can't. I can't," John says, and he doesn't know if he means what Kyle evidently wants from him (and how had that happened, what did he do to...oh _God_ , this is all his fault), or the consecuences of refusing.

He can feel Kyle tensing, preparing to flee, and he panics even further. 

The great John Connor, for once knowing true fear. With all he's prepared himself to let go.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry," Kyle repeats, miserably, and John shakes his head, seizes his head in his hands and kisses his cheek, the side of his forehead, buries his fingers on his hair.

Please, don't go," he says, clutching at Kyle desperately. He doesn't know what to do; so he offers the only untainted truth he has. The only truth that is only his. " _Please._  You're all I have. _You're all I have_."

Kyle stills; he does not truly relax, but stops fighting to get away. He puts an arm tentatively back around John, in a loose embrace, and touches his face with the other hand.

"It's not your fault. I knew you wouldn't..."

John buries his face in Kyle's shoulder, this time. He can't bear to look the expression on his face.

"It is. It is my fault. I just can't, I..." John repeats. 

Kyle doesn't say anything else. They stay like that, not looking at each other but not breaking apart.

John has had countless people die both for and because of him; he doesn't quite know why he's never feel more unworthy than in this moment.

*

Things don't really change all that much, after that.

They should have, John knows; but he's not less selfish than he was before, and Kyle seems to want nothing more than to pretend it never happened.

Perhaps there's a certain stiffeness when they comfort each other; perhaps Kyle is not truly at ease anymore when they continue to share sleeping places.

John can't...he can't be what Kyle wants him to be, and can't tell him what they already are; instead he tries to make ammends by giving what's within his means.

_I'm sorry,_ John thinks. After all the sacrifices Kyle had made, would made for him. _I'm sorry I'm taking this from you, too._

On sleepless nights, he talks to Kyle about his life before, all that he's never told anybody, to keep John Connor for being just another man, with hopes and fears and mistakes. He tells him about the time he got his ear pierced, and about the unfortunate haircut he got when he was a teenager, and about the crappy jobs he subsisted on before the war.

And he tells him about Sarah.

It is not deliberate, at first; but so much of him is tangled with her, that is sort of inevitable.

"And your father?" Kyle asks one night.

John takes a deep breath, and looks him in the eye. _You have his eyes,_ Sarah had told him once, but he knows it was just wishful thinking. 

The shade of blue of John's eyes is exactly hers.

Kyle's are darker, and warmer.

"I never knew him," he says. "But he was a better man that what I could ever hope to be, I know that much."

*

John is fidgeting with the picture he carries on his pocket; though he knows he shouldn't.

It is battered enough as it is, and what would be the chances, that he somehow ruins it now, after having survived for so many unlikely years?

But nothing will happen to the picture; and it will change hands without a hitch.

For a second, John wishes he could burn it.

He sits next to Kyle, on the mess, after a battle; he waits for them to have finished eating, and starts.

"Did I ever tell you....?"

Kyle turns to him, and John pushes down the irrational impulse to clench his fists. He just swallows, and does what he has to do. It's just as out of his reach as his own past, and Kyle's future.

"She's my mother. Sarah."

Kyle takes the picture with infinite, reverent care; looks at it for a long moment, and then at John.

"Of course. You resemble her a lot."

_She mourned you for the rest of her life_ , John thinks, reaching out to touch the bruised curve of Kyle's cheekbone. _She loved you from the moment she saw you, and forever._.

Kyle smiles faintly at him, and then they both look down, at her pensive face, at her sad eyes.

"Yes, I do. I'm a lot like her," he says, counting the days he has left.

**Author's Note:**

> Aaaand about two weeks late, it is done! All curses go to Pillstaker, all doubts and complains to me (it's not like the lazy sod will ever check his inbox).


End file.
